Second Peter 1:1 tells us that we “have been allotted faith equally precious as ours.” The God-given faith is allotted to all believers as a common precious portion. As long as we have this gift, we have the lot of God’s inheritance, for living faith equals the lot of God’s inheritance. When Paul indicated in Colossians 1:12 that Christ is the allotted portion of the saints, he had in view the allotment of the good land of Canaan given to the children of Israel for their inheritance. Likewise, Peter had the same view in mind when he in 2 Peter 1:1 spoke of our being allotted faith equally precious as ours. Peter realized that just as the children of Israel were allotted a piece of the good land (Josh. 13:6; 14:1-5; 19:51), all the New Testament believers are the children of God who inherit that which has been promised by God, that is, faith that has been allotted to them. This implies that the “all things which relate to life and godliness” (2 Pet. 1:3), including the divine nature (v. 4) partaken of by the believers through the equally precious faith according to the precious and exceedingly great promises, are the real inheritance given to the believers by God in the New Testament. The good land, the portion of the children of Israel in Old Testament times, typifies the all-inclusive Christ. As the good land was the portion of the Old Testament saints, so Christ is the portion of the New Testament believers. Furthermore, in the Old Testament the good land was allotted to the twelve tribes, and in the New Testament precious faith is allotted to us.
How can faith be our allotted portion? According to the Bible, Christ is our portion. This means that it is Christ who has been allotted to us. But 2 Peter 1:1 says that we have been allotted faith equally precious. To speak of Christ being our portion may be somewhat doctrinal. It is more experiential to say that faith is our portion. If Christ were merely Christ to us and not also faith, we would not be able to participate or share in Him. In order for us to partake of Christ, He must become our faith. Such a faith has been allotted by God to all believers in Christ as their portion. Faith has become our portion of the New Testament inheritance.
Faith is not merely a means; it is also a portion. A means is an instrument through which we obtain something, but a portion is the thing we obtain. In 2 Peter 1:1 faith is not a means; rather, it is the thing, the object, we receive. Therefore, in this verse faith equals the inheritance. According to the New Testament, faith in a certain sense is a means. In particular, faith is the means by which we receive salvation and eternal life (Eph. 2:8). But in 2 Peter 1:1 faith is not considered as a means but an allotment, a portion of the New Testament inheritance allotted to us by God.
Faith in 2 Peter 1:1 is equal to the New Testament inheritance. Our portion is Christ, the embodiment of the Triune God. This Christ is revealed in the New Testament and conveyed to us through the New Testament. The New Testament is a container of the Christ who embodies the Triune God. This container conveys Christ to us mainly by way of the preaching and teaching of the Word. The preaching and the teaching of the apostles always convey Christ to others. The Triune God is embodied in Christ, and Christ is contained in the New Testament. Then this Christ is conveyed to us through the preaching and teaching of the Word. The New Testament contains Christ, and those who preach the New Testament bring this container to us. Through this means this container conveys Christ to us. Faith, then, comes from hearing, and hearing comes from the word (Rom. 10:17). The function of the Word is to convey Christ to us. Therefore, Christ comes to us through the preaching and teaching of the word of the New Testament.
The all-inclusive Christ is not only the Word but also the life-giving Spirit. While Christ is preached to us through the Word and conveyed by the Word, He simultaneously works within us as the Spirit to produce faith in us. The issue of the faith produced within us is that whatever Christ is according to the word of the New Testament is imparted to us. As a result, we have the reality of Christ.
Faith and Christ are one. The faith, which is the response to the content of the Word is actually Christ. This means that the response is one with that to which it is responding. When in our experience our response and the Christ conveyed to us through the preaching of the Word become one, faith is produced within us. Therefore, our faith and Christ, who is the object of our faith, are actually one. This is the portion of the New Testament inheritance that God has allotted to us.
Faith is not initiated by us, and it is not something that is out of us. On the contrary, faith is out of God, it is initiated by God, and it is allotted to us by God. Faith comes to us by the word in God’s revelation. When this word is preached to us, it conveys the reality of the New Testament inheritance. As this word is preached to us, simultaneously the Spirit works with it. Actually, according to the Bible, the word and the Spirit are one. In John 6:63 the Lord Jesus said, “The words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” The word is the Spirit, and the Spirit is the word (Eph. 6:17). Therefore, through the spoken word and by the working, the inspiring, of the Spirit, faith is produced within us. This is the way that God allots to us the equally precious faith. Through the spoken word and by the inspiring Spirit, God infuses faith into our being. Once this faith has been imparted into us, we have our portion of the New Testament inheritance.
The Greek word translated “equally precious” means “of equal value or honor”; hence, equally precious. It does not mean equal in measure but in value and honor to all those who receive it. Faith is equally precious to all the believers in Christ, no matter whether they are Jews or Gentiles. We have the same faith that Peter had. Although Peter was a great apostle, in quality the faith he had was not different from the faith that we have. He and we share the equally precious faith. All the believers in the Gentile world share with all those in the Jewish land the same precious faith, which enables them to substantiate the blessing of life of the New Testament as their common portion allotted to them by God.
The expression allotted faith equally precious as ours in 2 Peter 1:1 indicates that in the whole universe there is only one faith as a portion allotted to all God’s redeemed people. In the Old Testament the land of Canaan was the unique good land allotted by God as an inheritance to His people Israel. When the people of Israel entered into the good land and possessed it, that one good land was divided into portions and allotted to each family of the twelve tribes of Israel (Num. 33:51-54). Similarly, there is one great matter which is called faith. God has allotted a portion of this unique faith to each of His chosen people. Thus, we all have the same unique faith. We all have an allotted portion of this one faith.
At the juncture when we believed, it was we who were believing, but it was God who was allotting a portion of the unique faith into us. The name of that unique faith is Jesus Christ. The faith that we have to believe in Christ is Christ Himself (Rom. 3:22; Gal. 2:16a). There is only one Jesus who is faith to us. Therefore, our faith is uniquely one.
We all have the same precious faith in quality, but the quantity of faith that we have depends upon how much we contact the living God so that we may have Him increased in us (Rom. 12:3; Heb. 11:1, 5-6, 27; Col. 2:19). When God increases in us, faith grows in us.
Peter calls the faith, which has been allotted to us through God’s exceedingly abundant grace, “precious.” Faith is precious. It enables us to believe in what we could never believe in, and when it enters into us, it is obtained once and for all and will never leave us. It is impossible for any man to believe in the mystery and centrality of the gospel of God by his natural life. According to human reasoning, it is not believable that the Lord Jesus is God incarnated, was born of a virgin, died to propitiate man’s sins, rose from the dead, ascended into the heavens, is seated at the right hand of God, and will return one day. But when this precious faith enters into our being, we can and must believe. The more we believe, the more we feel pleasant and comfortable. Once we obtain this precious faith, it can never be lost. Once we obtain this precious faith, we will never disbelieve. It is impossible for us to truly not believe, even though we may occasionally deny Him, because the precious faith given to us is in us.
Faith is the substantiation of the substance of the things hoped for (Heb. 11:1). The substance of the New Testament blessings is invisible, abstract, and mysterious; it cannot be felt by our emotion or be seen by our eyes. We cannot see the divine life by our natural sight, nor can we sense or touch the divine life by our natural feeling. Furthermore, God Himself, who is the greatest of all the New Testament blessings, is invisible, mysterious, and abstract. None of our physical senses can substantiate Him. In order to substantiate all the New Testament blessings, we need another sense, that is, faith. Faith is the substantiation of the divine, spiritual, and heavenly substance of the New Testament blessings. Faith substantiates God as the main substance of the New Testament blessings. It also substantiates the divine life, the Spirit of God, and the law of the Spirit of life. Faith is an exceedingly great matter. It is not of ourselves; rather, it is a gift granted to us by God and a portion allotted to us by God. If we have the divine faith as our allotted portion, we have all the reality of God’s New Testament economy with all its blessings.
Faith is also the substantiation of the substance of the truth (v. 1), which is the reality of the contents of God’s New Testament economy. The contents of God’s New Testament economy are composed of the “all things which relate to life and godliness” (2 Pet. 1:3), that is, the Triune God dispensing Himself into us as life within and godliness without. The equally precious faith, allotted to us by God through the word of God’s New Testament economy and the Spirit, responds to the reality of such contents and ushers us into the reality, making its substance the element of our Christian life and experience. Such a faith is allotted to all the believers in Christ as their portion, which is equally precious to all who have received it. As such a portion from God, this faith is objective to us in the divine truth. But it brings all the contents of its substantiation into us, thus making them all, with itself (faith), subjective to us in our experience. This can be compared to the scenery (truth) and the seeing (faith) being objective to the camera (us). But when the light (the Spirit) brings the scenery to the film (our spirit) within the camera, both the seeing and the scenery become subjective to the camera.
God’s economy, God’s plan, is to dispense Himself into our being as our life and life supply. Therefore, God’s New Testament economy is simply for God’s dispensing. This economy has a content, this content has a reality, and this reality is the truth revealed in the Bible. The Bible is not merely a book of doctrine; it is a revelation of the truth, which is the reality of the content of God’s economy. This reality has a substance. Only faith can substantiate this substance. Hence, faith is the substantiation of the substance of the reality of the New Testament economy.
This faith is the real portion of God’s allotment. It is the reality of the New Testament economy allotted to us in and by the righteousness of God, which is also the righteousness of our Savior, Jesus Christ. This twofold righteousness—the righteousness of God and of Christ—is the sphere in which and the means by which the New Testament portion has been allotted to us.